5 reasons you should practice hitting balls off a tee

One of my favorite training aids when I teach is the simple golf tee. There are so many ways you can use a tee to help improve your motion and provide valuable feedback.

Surprisingly, golfers often think it is a penalty to have to use a tee, but I strongly believe the opposite: you can use the tee to your advantage.

Here are five reasons I believe every golfer should practice hitting balls off a tee.

1. Great for warming up

Once you are into a full swing, it can be a great idea to start with a low tee to get the swing going without having to worry as much about hitting the ball and then the ground. Using the tee as feedback for where you are hitting the ground is very helpful. When swinging any club other than the driver, the tee should be hit and even broken if you are swinging with enough speed. Doing this during your warm-up can build confidence and help the rest of the day go better.

2. Avoid lifting

I have seen it over and over again. Once a golfer truly understands how to get the ball into the air, the tee becomes less necessary. For a newer golfer, it can take some time to understand and trust that the club needs to get all the way down to the turf.

I often see golfers incorrectly trying to scoop or lift the golf ball when it is sitting on the ground. A much more direct path to the proper motion is to put the ball on a tee with the intent of hitting the tee. Even practicing with just a tee, without a ball, and having the intent to hit it can be great practice.

3. Teaches a proper divot pattern

Once the club gets down to the ground, you want it to stay on the ground. This is another opportunity to use golf tees to provide feedback. Place your golf ball on a tee, and then stick another tee into the ground on the target side of the ball so that a small portion of it is sticking up and out of the ground.

With a proper swing and motion, the club should get down to the ground and stay low after the ball. The clubhead should scrape along the ground, creating the conditions for a proper divot. Learning to scrape both tees out of the ground with the clubhead gives you immediate feedback that you are making the proper motion — one that should also work when you take the tees away.

4. “Scrape” the forward tee

A more advanced version of the two-tee drill is to place a tee flat on the ground on the target side of the ball, with the tee pointing relatively toward the target. The goal is similar: hit the ground and then keep the clubhead low enough to scrape the tee. This helps encourage the low point and divot to occur after the ball.

Your club should be low enough to scrape the tee. If you do this correctly, the ball will certainly get into the air. Don’t be fooled if the ball simply rolls and the tee moves. If you top the ball, it may move the ball, but that is not the feedback you are looking for. You want the club to scrape the tee, and the flight of the ball will provide additional feedback.

5. Tee pass-through

If you struggle to hit the center of the face and tend to hit the heel or toe, the tee pass-through is a great drill. Place a ball on a tee and then place another tee into the ground on each side of the ball, rather than in front of it. Make the space relatively narrow so that the clubhead fits through, but not with a lot of extra room.

If your setup is good and you allow your arms to extend down properly, the club should be able to pass through the tees, allowing you to find the center of the face. If your setup is too crowded, you will tend to hit the outside tee, which will likely lead to a heel strike. If your setup is too far away and you are reaching for the ball, you will tend to hit the inside tee, which can lead to a toe strike.

This is a great drill for giving you feedback on your posture and the spacing between your hands and thighs.